Frozen Laughs
by FireFairy219
Summary: 'Capture every moment that is worth it in a picture, TK. Those flashes last but a second, but they freeze your joy forever.' Oneshot.


Disclaimer: No copyright infringement intended; I do not own Digimon nor do I own the song "Best of You" by The Foo Fighters. The only thing I do own is the storyline.

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**FROZEN LAUGHS**

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It was nearing nightfall. And, if one was listening attentively and somewhat superstitiously enough, a single bird could be heard calling out to its fellow congener, making screeching noises. In a way, they sounded pitiful; it was as if the airborne creature had been flying off course, could not find the rest of its flock and was pleading for help now, which was surely in vain at this late time of day.

A blond-haired man who appeared to be around the age of 25 didn't bother to switch on the lights of his apartment's living room he was currently in, though, and turned on the flatscreen television instead. He could hear the lone bird outside and with an ironic grimace thought of similar human feelings of his own, which he discarded right away.

He seemed to have difficulties settling for one programme and couldn't watch one for longer than 30 seconds before he became bored of it and zapped to the next.

And so, by the time that he got through the complete set of 999 channels, the sun had completely set, shrouding the sky in a dark veil on which small shiny dots began to appear, as if the sun had put on a glittery blanket when she had clocked off and went to sleep. In its place, the moon began to appear, ready to take the next shift. She shed some light over the trees in the park nearby where the bird was probably residing for the night, its wretched cries scarcely being ventilated anymore.

He let a sigh escape his lips and turned off the TV where he had been staring at numbly for the last hour.

"Unbelievable! The stains really have gone! Like I said, trust pink, forget…"

With it, the only light source vanished as well, and the room was drenched in darkness, as was he.

It left him with no distractions and as an inevitable consequence, his train of thoughts rode him back to what he had desperately tried to avoid for the past three weeks. _Great._

He grudgingly couldn't deny however that when everything in your being craves to remember and feel again, something as futile as willpower on its own cannot defy one such strong current of emotions.

Another sigh, deeper than the previous one, was released and his mind forced her beautiful features to be seen once again. They were impulses stimulated by his heart. _Silly heart_, he thought, _as if I could ever forget._

Surely no man could ever forget her smooth chocolate brown hair, or her ruby red eyes that always looked as if she could see beyond the eye and read his soul. Surely he himself could never forget how her slender body fit against his and the feelings it ignited when they made even the smallest contact, her heavenly smile that would disarm anyone from any depressed feelings, nor her radiant glow she appeared to emit, lighting up the rest of the room unconsciously. He could never forget, because she was his angel.

Was.

Clenching his eyes shut at these soul-cringing memories that not so long ago used to be realities, and forcing his mind to forget about these images, he hopelessly tried to focus on anything else.

Well, that was an epic failure.

He clutched his blond locks in his fists and let out an "aargh!" in defeat and aggravation. The rising urge of seeing her again had suddenly reached its peak and overwhelmed him to the point where he wasn't even sure what decided it for him – his frustration or his desire – to jump up from the couch and to walk-run across his room, over to his old cupboard which was packed with forgotten things and tons of paper that were probably never looked at again when put in there.

After switching on the light, which, in his hurry, he had surprisingly still remembered, he rummaged through the packed shelves feverishly. And after what felt like hours to him, finally obtained the object he had been looking for.

'_Memories'_

He moved towards the couch again and placed the picture album on the small table in front of it, while quickly plopping down on the sofa and excitedly inching closer so that his head was hovering above the book. The typical paper smell pervaded his nostrils, along with a scent of a familiar perfume lingering and as an unconscious reaction, his head pulled itself down to smell it even better.

In the same hurry as before, he took the cover in his left hand and was about to open his lost treasure at last, but all of a sudden, the frenzy stopped.

Hesitation permeated his mind.

What if he opened that folder, and all the subdued memories came rolling over him in waves?

What if they drowned him in sorrow and he couldn't remember how to swim to the surface?

What if he couldn't handle the _truth_?

His hand, as well as the book itself, began to shake at the prospect.

_No_. He was stronger than that. He was an Ishida goddammit and had survived tougher things than this. _What's saving a life compared to looking in a book, huh?_

No way was he letting himself get lost because of something as ridiculous as an album... His determination forced his cerulean eyes to focus on the task at hand and to open the book cautiously. You never know if some sort of magical imp conjured up from his emotions would decide to jump at him.

It didn't. Quite the contrary, actually. Because on that feared first page, pictures of children playing joyously together could be seen.

A little boy with a green shirt and brown trousers not coming further than his knees was laughing without a care in the world. Next to him, a girl who appeared to be his age and who was wearing a yellow jumper over pink shorts was slightly taller than him and had her left arm wrapped around the boy's shoulder. Both made the peace sign and were probably laughing at some game they had been playing beforehand.

In the next photos, similar expressions could be seen on children's faces, mostly their own but sometimes accompanied by siblings or other friends.

Happy times.

He couldn't stop himself from staring at the pictures intriguingly, even though there had been _some_ reluctance to do this mere minutes ago. They worked like magnets and sucked the man in, making him believe he was 8 years old again. It made him float in a timestruck world, where everything had reverted to the world of the pictures, where the sun was shining, he was playing tag, and smiling was customary. He was carefree once more and it felt amazing; why didn't he think of this obviously brilliant idea before again?

The ones depicted were ageing.

And he knew that by now, the images had been taken when he started out in middle school, judging from the newer friends that made their appearances in the rectangular pieces of paper.

He smiled wistfully; they had no idea back then what would happen 15 years later.

And that single thought made him wonder about photographs. Just a moment frozen in time, where the characters inside would live happily ever after and they didn't have to care about anything else than laughing for eternity.

The way he thought it made it _appealing_ to just remain immobile in a smiling state where bliss reigned endlessly.

He turned the page eagerly.

Here, the photos had been fast-forwarded to the girl in the yellow jumper and pink shorts 8 years later. She had changed a lot since and had grown up to be a beautiful young woman, but was still recognisable by her soft, angelic features.

Turn.

His timestruck world warped when he was pulled out of his reverie at the most recent pictures. Pictures of him and her. As a couple.

The blissful smile disappeared for a look of sorrow once more. And yet, that drastic change in emotions didn't stop him from turning the pages nor from absorbing the beauty that was Hikari Yagami. For even now, on paper, she had that strong hold on him; a hold of which he was never sure how she managed it – perhaps she was not as fragile as he'd always told himself then.

Turn 23 in the story of their joint lives; in the book that was telling him how blissful ignorance was in a way too bittersweet to be appreciated.

One particular picture of them caught his eye. He remembered that it was Davis who had actually managed to take this good photograph, having borrowed Kari's famous camera that always hung around her neck at high school but at that moment had moved to her purse already, seeing as high school had ended a year or two ago.

It was a picture of love, taken at a reunion in the Digital World. He had turned around instinctively upon hearing his name being called, and had stopped dead in his tracks immediately when he found himself facing his girlfriend only half a metre away from him. He remembered her smile growing when she noticed his dumbfounded expression on his face, her love that lay in it radiating. As well as he remembered how he in turn had begun to smile back at her, requiting her sentiments. And he would never forget how both had just stood there staring at each other, the only ones present in their homemade, invisible bubble that shut out all sound and time.

Until the flash awoke them from their collective trance and they glanced up in surprise, trying to gather their thoughts and surroundings as they had been so caught up in the intensity of the moment that it had erased all other relevant information.

Takeru's eyes darkened at this. At the perfectness of the moment that was captured by his rival of old, at the feeling of loss, and most of all, at the irony of it all.

Whereas he first was so excited and absorbed by the album, he now looked at it in repugnance, and leafed through the last pages quickly until halting at the last one.

A photo of forced laughter that was shot on his brother's wedding to Mimi, completely in contrast with the former pictures, greeted him. The foundation of their relationship had been falling apart bit by bit then, and the cracks were already showing on the outside clearly.

He faintly recalled his previous thoughts of eternal happiness in pictures, and sardonically noted how that eternalness also applied to fake laughs, which surely must be torture if one were to live in this state forever.

And in that instant of flimsy recollections of thoughts, he cogently made a pact with himself never to take a picture again. It painstakingly reminded him of the love he and Kari had shared – emphasis on the past tense 'had' – and a confrontation thereof was simply unbearable.

With what almost looked like a face full of disgust, he closed the album and put it away quickly in the cupboard of lost things, cursing his broken heart for doing such a good job at convincing him to relive his pain. And later on, for his weakness in being too kind to throw the damn thing away; he guessed her strings would never fully lose their strength when it came to him.

'_I've got another confession to make, I'm your fool. Everyone's got their chains to break, holding you…'_

It was Kari's favourite song.

It was also his cell phone's ringtone.

"Hey Yolei. How are you?" he asked deadpanned, but in an attempt to sound civil.

"Yeah well, things aren't going so well on this end of the line."

"You're here? Uhm, okay. But I don't know if I'm in the mood really."

"Yeah, okay..."

"Yeah..."

"Yes, you're right, but..."

"Okay then! Jeez, no need to completely block my ears with your yelling! I'll come with, all right?"

"Yes, I'll see you in a minute."

He pressed the red phone symbol to end the short-lived conversation, and as he stared at the electrical piece of equipment afterwards, felt some feelings of doubt wash over him at Yolei's plan to set foot into the world again. After almost a month's worth of isolation though, this was not abnormal behaviour.

His eyes were drawn involuntarily to the rolled-up newspaper that was lying innocently on the kitchen table. If he were to open it, he would surely be confronted with a certain new happy couple. After all, he guessed it was only fair that when one of the most famous football players of the country marries the newspaper's most renowned photographer, they deserve an article or two in it.

This thought alone made all qualms vanish, and within less than a minute, he was fumbling with his key at the front door already, eager to get out and clear his head – or let some of his brain cells die in hopes of forgetting the whole situation for a day.

When he got down, he noticed Yolei was already waiting for him by her car that was double parked in front of his apartment.

The first thing that struck him was that she was wearing a very beautiful short dress, clearly set on going out.

He glanced upwards to her face and noticed the lack of glasses and obvious but handsome application of makeup.

Set on going out big time.

The second thing was that she wasn't gawking at him or looking at him pitifully like all his other friends had done whenever they had visited to check up on him. No, she was looking at him understandingly, with a cool gaze that betrayed nothing of those dreaded sympathising sentiments. _Thank God._

TK knew better though. Because although he hadn't exactly found time to catch up with his friends a lot – as he desperately was trying to keep his relationship alive – he still had caught eye of the way his purple-haired friend acted around a certain maroon-headed football player.

It made him feel connected to her somehow. Connected through pain, sorrow and heartache. A connection that went without the spilling of words.

They both got in the car, driving off to some bar or club with the intention to drink and dance till they dropped. To pass the time, they made some small talk and gave crazy remarks, carefully avoiding the more complicated topics neither of them were willing to talk about.

It was nice for a change.

And, for a moment, he felt that blissful feeling of old returning to him. The feeling that sprouts on carefree times, where you don't need to think, and you just laugh at your own silliness and that of your companion.

On reflex, Takeru took out his cell phone in order to take a picture of their fun evening out, as he had grown accustomed to that habit over the years he had spent with a (now professional) photographer.

He stared at the action his hands were executing, and faintly heard Yolei ask why he was taking so long to press the damn button.

Remembering his promise to himself, he wanted to toss the thing away and never think of what he was about to do again, but strangely enough, he halted himself. It was at that moment that something akin to an epiphany hit him. Only, it wasn't, it was a memory about Kari. One where he recalled her telling him something important about photography when he had questioned her constant urge to take pictures.

'_Capture every moment that is worth it in a picture, TK. Those flashes last but a second, but they freeze your joy forever.'_

Flash.

He was wrong; taking pictures wasn't something that was solely linked to his former relationship, it was something that was meant for everyone and for every pleasurable time one encounters, because pictures are taken to remember the fun times one has.

He smiled down at his hands that enclosed his black Samsung Star, and countered that he was getting there.

He smiled in the pictures that he took, he smiled throughout the evening, and he smiled because he felt alive and happy for the first time in what felt like ages.

Realisation had dawned on him that night: it's the moment you need to live in, not the past or the future; today is what matters. And today he was glad he could share another unique, joyful experience.

But this time, without her.

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**A/N**: I am alive! I know I kind of ignored my other fanfic for like over 2 months, but I am a poor student, i.e. all my spare time goes to studying, studying, and stress caused by, what do you know, studying. So yeah, I'm making excuses here that you've probably read multiple times in other Author's Notes already.

As for why I made TK sad by letting Kari leave him for Davis, I haven't got a clue actually. It just seemed to fit I guess. Originally, this was supposed to be a fic about TK and Kari having a long distance relationship (I was addicted to 'Set the Fire to the Third Bar' back when I started this), but it ended up being something entirely else. What do you think? Leave a review plz, they make me sooooo happy :D

And it's not that bad, I mean, I didn't kill him off to escape his grief or something like that :p


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